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Where were YOU when the Purple M&M Disappeared?

M&Ms. A highly popular chocolate candy that started back in 1941, given to American soldiers during WWII. Since then, the Mars Company’s tiny colorful treat has spawned mega stores (think Las Vegas), characters, colors and merchandising as far as the eye can see. It’s that same popularity that in 1995 and again in 2002, inspired people all over the world to vote by the millions in elections to pick a new color to be added to the bag.

It is that 2002 election that brings me here today. Back then, the colors on the ballot were: purple, pink and aqua. Purple won with 41% of the vote and supposedly was added to the regular bag that you can purchase at your local grocery store or movie theater today. But, tell me this: WHERE is that purple M&M now? When I open a bag of M&Ms, it’s not there. In fact, I haven’t seen the purple M&M in a long while.

What I propose that we have here people, is a chocolate candy conspiracy theory.

Let’s break it down.

The original M&M colors were brown in 1940 with black lettering, but as time marched on the lettering was changed to white and additional colors added. Violet was replaced by tan in 1949. Red, green and yellow were added in 1960. Orange made his debut in 1976 and then in the first ever M&M election, blue was added in 1995 with and overwhelming 51% of the vote. (Opponent colors were purple and pink.) This election was held to determine what color should replace the tan M&M, who was going into retirement.

Ok, so that makes sense, blue won, fair and square, same number of colors, 6. But this is where it gets suspicious. Perhaps overwhelmed with a need of sensationalism, Mars decides to have another election, to add another color. This color isn’t replacing anyone, just making the number of colors in a bag 7. So in 2002 another election is held where purple is declared the winner and will now be in bags of M&Ms. Hooray! Go purple.

Theory #1

It appears that this “election” was merely a stunt to garner attention by Mars for their aging candy. Since that election, purple has mysteriously disappeared, only to be seen in mega stores, online and lavender at Easter time. Pushed aside so that the lazy Mars company can get away with only producing 6 colors instead of 7. Well, Mars, if you didn’t want to make 7 colors, than you shouldn’t have had an election for a 7th. And if that’s the case, Purple won her right to represented in the bag at all times, not in custom orders next to silver and fuschia! Purple deserves more than to be included in the occasional wedding favor or Las Vegas souvenir! There was an election! I remember, I voted!

Theory #2

As we know, each of the colors of M&Ms has a cartoon-like character associated with it, the only female character being Green. Red and Yellow are the standard spokesmen on TV and other media, Red representing milk chocolate and Yellow representing the peanut contingent. Brown, Orange and Blue have assumed less visual roles, but are definitely in existence. In this scenario, the introduction of Purple to their little group proved to be too much. We’ll assume that if Purple had survived, a female persona would have been the gender, perhaps making one too many ladies for Green. And in true Clue style, I propose that Green, true to her envious color, killed Purple off, in the M&Ms factory with a blow torch. I can picture it: the cackling, the screaming and the last words that Purple ever heard as uttered by Green, “Purple melts anywhere, especially by fire!”

Theory #3

Purple found herself an untimely, accidental death. Perhaps she slipped in the shower, perhaps she was suffocated in someone’s pocket or perhaps one of the other M&Ms and she were at the beach and the undertow pulled her in and rather than call the cops or report her missing, an elaborate cover up by the Mars corporation began to take place. And by elaborate I mean that they simply stopped putting purple in the bag and hoped no one would notice. Or maybe this is why they’ve started whoring themselves out to movies so much recently, changing the colors around and “M” imprints to other icons to confuse and keep the populace at large guessing. I speak of the Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Pirates of the Caribbean 3 and Indiana Jones & The Crystal Skull promotions. (Notice that all were awful sequel movies too.)

Theory #4

When you think of the color purple and company logos, what character do you think of? Grimace, of course. McDonald’s pear shaped purple pal of Ronald McDonald’s. Sure, Grimace gives off the friendly vibe, loves everyone, heck the guy can barely put together two sentences, let alone any sort of audible conversation, which is all the more reason to suspect him. Why would Grimace hurt Purple? Well, McDonald’s offers the McFlurry, a vanilla ice cream concoction with pieces of brightly colored chocolate candy, that suspiciously resembles and tastes like M&Ms. Which, I’m sure, doesn’t sit well with Mars.

So perhaps in a move to climb up the corporate character ladder, (having always been overshadowed by Ronald) Grimace sought to promote the McFlurry, showing corporate where his loyalties lie, and in a mafia-style blitz he ate Purple. I also imagine he probably sent Mars a finger or toe to “encourage” them to back off their campaign to cease and desist of McDonald’s use of “candy coated chocolate pieces.”

And also, by consuming Purple, it eliminated the competition, thus making him the lone purple representative in the major corporate logo world.

Now that you have been presented with the theories, it’s time to decide. And what I want to know is:

maybe i didn’t eat many M&Ms back in the day, but i’ve never seen a purple M&M and it would be nice to see one. It would be nice to see another color besides the original six. QUIT BEING SO SELFISH> and i hope the guy or whoever makes them reads this post. what about pink or aqua? who cares? Purple won the election so why is it gone? Who’s idea was it in the first place to get rid of the purple M&M? I wanna meet them

so i went to kroger today and picked out a type of candy, m&ms of course, and when i got home i dumped them out on the table to eat them by order of color (i dont really know why, i just do that).in my bag of regular m&ms was one little purple m&m. no joke.
i didnt know if maybe you won a prize for finding a purple m&m or something (there wasnt anything unusual about the bag saying something about a purple m&m). so i went on google to see if there was anything about it and found this. now i dont know if it was a packaging mistake but i definitely found a purple m&m in my bag of regular m&ms.
so yea thats pretty cool